Corrosion under insulation (CUI) is a severe form of localized external corrosion that occurs on stainless steel (SS) that has been insulated.
In this article, the development of a customized program—designed by the author and used at Raffineria di Milazzo—for the continuous monitoring of creep in vessels and piping is explained.
Selecting mechanical seals for hot services in an oil refinery or petrochemical plant is always a challenging task—and it is a task that needs careful attention, since the wrong seal selection can have a significant impact on pump reliability and availability.
Stainless steel is a generic term used for a large group of corrosion-resistant alloys containing at least 10.5% chromium (Cr), and possibly containing other alloying elements like nickel (Ni), molybdenum (Mo), manganese (Mn) and nitrogen (N).
The human factor has played a significant role in chemical plant accidents and production loss incidents over the past 60 yr.
During the end-of-run (EOR) period of the authors’ company’s residue hydrodesulfurization (RDS) process in early February 2019, some hot spots occurred in the catalysts of the reactors.
As with all industries, chemical manufacturing is evolving in response to technical innovations, new customer requirements and increased global competition.
Consumers likely imagine natural gas as a stream of pure methane. Those who are closer to the energy industry know that methane is the major component, but there can easily be dozens of other substances making up a sizeable portion of the total volume.
Refineries and petrochemical plants are comprised of a series of crucial processes to produce transportation fuels, products and chemicals demanded by the global market. These processes consist of capital-intensive units that must be maintained to provide reliable performance. Failure to adequately maintain these assets can have a detrimental effect to not only operations and profit, but also to worker safety.
In these challenging times, fluidized catalytic cracking units (FCCUs) aim to improve margins by processing poorer- or different-quality feeds, while maintaining good yield performance.